The owner of the trouble-plagued Taipei 101 skyscraper yesterday said it has not received any reports of potential tenants withdrawing from its planned four-floor shopping mall and the mall's October opening will remain as scheduled.
"We have not received any information from our tenants that any want to withdraw from their lease in the shopping mall," said Harace Lin (
"Our plan to attract business investment will continue as planned and the opening of the shopping mall in October will remain the same," Lin said.
In a press statement issued yesterday the company also said that it had received support from its potential tenants, which include the Grand Formosa Regent and the fitness center franchise Youth Camp, who said they would move into the 162-store mall as planned.
The press release said that 70 percent of the mall's tenants have signed an agreement with the TFCO and paid their deposits.
Lin led reporters on an inspection of the fire-damaged construction site.
He said the cost of Thursday's fire damage was minor, just a few million NT dollars and the insurance company is working out the precise amount of money.
Lin refuted allegations that the fire had been caused by a discarded cigarette
"We imposed a very strict regulation forbidding smoking on the construction site," he said.
"We have a 101 Public Construction Safety Foundation that includes 10 engineering specialists who are designated specifically to inspect the safety of the site," he said.
"Any worker caught smoking in [non-smoking] areas would face fines up to NT$2,000," Lin said.
Taipei City Fire Department, which is responsible for determining the cause of the fire, has said it could not rule out the possibility of negligence.
The department's Fire Investigation Squad yesterday suggested that negligence might be to blame, noting that cigarette butts had been found on the roof of the podium tower and that worn-out electric cables had also been discovered.
Investigators have also said that there was no welding work going on when the fire broke out.
The city government said construction of the roof of the podium tower was suspended immediately after the fire, but work on the main tower and other parts of the complex is continuing.
RSS